Lithium-ion Battery Safety Bill [HL]

Viscount Camrose Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 6th September 2024 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Camrose (Con)]

I join other noble Lords in thanking the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, for bringing this hugely important topic to us today. I thank all noble Lords who have spoken so well and so fascinatingly in this debate. I appreciated the horrifying example offered by the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, of the fire on board a ship started by an electric vehicle. My noble friend Lord Holmes was on the money, as ever, in calling for an overall governmental battery strategy. The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and the noble Lord, Lord Foster, also stressed the importance of working with the online marketplaces, as they are a really dangerous source of some of these unsafe items.

The noble Lord, Lord Winston, in addition to giving an—in my case, rather overdue—erudite chemistry lesson about batteries, made a very important point about the role that education can play in driving the safety of batteries. The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, powerfully supported this argument with accounts of her own. I was struck also by the call of the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, for mandating specialist fire extinguishers; that is a very interesting idea.

I am also grateful to the London Fire Brigade for its comprehensive briefing, and to the other groups which gave us briefings. Like, I think, almost every other speaker, I latched on to the statistic of 143 e-bike fires—a fire every two days—in London, resulting in three deaths and 60 injuries. It is a very powerful statistic, and we should really take note of it. I will not talk more about the importance of safety because other noble Lords have made this point so clearly and so well.

I turn to the market for lithium-ion batteries. The global market is expected to grow from $56.8 billion last year to $187 billion in 2032. I hope and think that the UK has a significant role to play in the safe development of this huge and hugely important industry. Without it, we will not realise our ambitions for electric vehicles; renewable energy and storage; tech innovation of all kinds; environmental and productivity improvements to manufacturing and supply chains; the circular economy and recycling; and a range of export opportunities. So we on these Benches absolutely support the Bill’s goals. It is essential for both safety and growth that lithium-ion batteries are safe.

That said, we need to be satisfied on a range of questions about the Bill’s workability, effectiveness and proportionality. First, how does this work alongside both existing and planned legislation? As others have raised, I ask the Minister to give the Government’s assessment of the existing product safety laws. I believe that lithium-ion batteries are already subject to the Electrical Equipment (Safety) Regulations 2016. Are these regulations inadequate, or is there an issue of enforcement? The Bill proposes a role for conformity assessment bodies, and I would welcome more clarity on the role of these CABs, as opposed to the OPSS and the local authority trading standards, both of which have relevant enforcement powers. Like other noble Lords, I look forward to hearing more about the Government’s Product Regulation and Metrology Bill, particularly with respect to lithium-ion battery safety. I would certainly welcome a sense from the Minister of the overlap between the two Bills.

Secondly, we are not, of course, the only nation wrestling with battery safety. I would welcome the chance to understand the Government’s view of the international context: which countries have implemented the most effective regulatory systems, and what can we learn from them? I was interested to hear briefly from the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay—I am sure she has more to say on the subject—about some of the regulations in New York in this respect.

Thirdly, how do we ensure that these regulations are proportionate? A BESS can be anything from an enormous industrial site to a domestic appliance. I would welcome the views of the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, on the applicability of the same regulation and the same enforcement bodies to these very different participants in the marketplace. Equally, will it really be necessary or achievable for a proposed BESS to consult separately with three different public bodies in seeking approval? Is this an appropriate way to achieve our growth means?

Finally, is it appropriate to focus solely on lithium-ion batteries? A number of noble Lords raised this, particularly the noble Lords, Lord Winston and Lord Holmes, who spoke compellingly on the different chemistries of other batteries and how they may also form part of this legislation.

Lithium-ion batteries are important, but their safety clearly needs to improve. As I have set out, we have some questions about the approach taken in the Bill, and I look forward to hearing from both the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale.